Nocturne: Rebirth
Nocturne: Rebirth (月夜に響くノクターン Rebirth) is a freeware RPG Maker XP game developed by Cogwheel/Shou in 2009 and translated to English by eplipswich in 2015. This is a remake of Nocturne, an RPG Maker 2000 game made by the same developer. Gameplay Active Time Battle If multiple party members have full ATB bars, the player can use certain keys or gamepad buttons to change which character to control. The player can also press a key or button to make both sides' ATB bars fill up without making their side take action. Puzzles While traversing dungeons, Reviel will run into blocked doors, invisible objects, barriers, and other obstacles. Invisible objects are difficult to see unless the player walks slowly or is at a high level, causing them to become more visible. Many obstacles that are normally opened through puzzles can be broken by spending EXP and MP if the player doesn't want to solve them. In each dungeon containing an elemental medium, Reviel can obtain key items that can be used in the field to solve certain puzzles. Familiars Random enemies will drop Core Object, which can be used to summon the enemy as a familiar servant with the same starting stats and abilities. Unlike their random enemy counterparts, familiars can be leveled up and can be summoned with Sorcery items to give them additional skills and stat modifications. Reviel can also choose to perform an EX summon, which summons the familiar with higher Max HP than normal at the cost of Reviel's own Max HP. When a familiar dies or is manually released, it'll be turned into a temporarily unusable Core Object and if applicable, Reviel will regain his Max HP from EX summoning. The broken Core Object can only be fixed at red or blue crystals. Skills Unlike familiars, who level up simply by gaining EXP, Reviel and Luna spend their EXP on learning and upgrading skills. Leveling up occurs when a character spends a certain amount of EXP, which increases their max HP, max MP, and max SP. Only upgrading skills will increase their base stats while learning a skill will open up more skills in the tree, meaning the player has to make a balance between learning new skills and upgrading old ones. Physical skills have long cooldown times and no MP cost while spells have short cooldown times, casting time, and an MP cost. Hybrid physical/elemental skills have the same cooldown as normal physical skills, but very low MP costs. Ultimate skills will temporarily darken the screen, are 100% accurate, have long cast times if they're offensive spells, and have very long cooldown times. Each character can equip eight active skills and eight passive skills at a time, with active skills being settable in battle too. Equipping a passive skill will cost SP, meaning it's impossible to use all passive skills at once. Unequipping an active skill will reset its cooldown, forcing the player to be mindful of which skills to equip. It's also possible to lower the level of a skill to reduce the MP or SP cost, allowing the player to use MP and SP efficiently when needed. Equipment Characters can change their equipment in battle without using their turn. Critical Hits Characters can deal smash hits and critical hits, which display yellow and red numbers respectively. This causes them to get their next turn faster in addition, making critical hits an important means of keeping a battle under control. Accuracy affects a character's chances of inflicting critical hits while evasion affects a character's chances of preventing critical hits. Brave Clear If a boss is beaten at the same level or lower than the dungeon's current Brave Clear level, they will drop an extra item as a reward. All party members, including familiars, have to meet this level condition to qualify for Brave Clear. If any character is overleveled, an appropriate level reset consumable item can be used, which also refunds their EXP if they're a non-familiar. Alchemy The NPC, Khaos, can be spoken to in order to synthesize new items depending on their alchemy recipe. Although the player can find new recipe lists in dungeons, it's possible to make any alchemy result as long as the player has enough materials. Plot Luna is chased by a trio of bandits, only to be saved by a myterious swordsman, Reviel. Out of gratitude, she invites the man to visit her village, Algiz, not knowing that he's a ruthless vampire who just recently awoke from a long slumber. However, Reviel realizes his powers were sealed, so he decides to hold off on destroying the village until he restores his strength to full. Characters *'Reviel Von De Russert' is a vampire who has a history of mass murder and a nihilistic outlook on life, but the villagers of Algiz are unaware of this and instead consider him a hero for saving Luna and fighting off threats to the village. He claims to only do so to gain their trust and kill off rival predators, but Luna believes there's more to his motivations than that. In terms of gameplay, Reviel can learn dual sword techniques, spells from every element except light, and status inflicting skills. *'Luna Winston' is a villager from Algiz who aspires to become a doctor after being saved by one in the past. She has an idealistic outlook on life and believes all life is precious, which Reviel is baffled by. In terms of gameplay, Luna can learn spear skills, light spells, healing thaumaturgy, and status buffs. *'Ristill Eva Mizants' is another vampire and Reviel's rival, who targets him because of her inferiority complex. She has the ability to summon Maxwells, fog like creatures that can possess others and strengthen them, but at the cost of their sanity. *'Khaos' is another vampire, who prefers to stay in his well-hidden house as a hermit than to get involved with others. Despite that, he's a gracious host to visitors and will also help Reviel with his alchemy needs. *'Shylphiel Wing' is Khaos's familiar, who has sentience unlike all other familiars. She's about as strong as the average human fighter and specializes in greatsword techniques and wind spells. *'Idith Midowin' is a vampire hunter and a master swordswoman who visits Algiz in order to investigate recent vampire attackers. Category:Active-Time RPG Category:Releases (RPG Maker XP) Category:Released in 2009 Category:Eastern Games Category:Completed Projects (PC)